The Press and Journal (Aberdeen and Aberdeenshire)
Let me secure pro-indy votes, MacNeil tells SNP
Blind belief without thinking is why we are living the Brexit economic nightmare
Western Isles MP Angus MacNeil has called on the SNP to stand aside to give him a free run on an independence ticket at the general election.
Mr MacNeil, who was thrown out of the SNP last August, told his former colleagues to “practise what they preach” in a row over wasted votes.
It comes after veteran nationalist MP Pete Wishart said he was bemused by the possibility of three other proindependence candidates contesting the new seat of Perth and Kinross-shire.
Mr MacNeil told The Press and Journal: “The SNP think solidarity is a one-way street, and arrogantly refuse to work with anyone, but make demands throwing their toys out of the pram.
“The SNP aren’t even making this election about independence but about asking Keir Starmer a question, wasting votes when Starmer inevitably says no.
“I think the SNP should practise what they preach and put independence first or stop preaching.”
First Minister Humza Yousaf fuelled the row in recent days, saying votes for the Greens and Alba Party will be wasted since neither has a hope of winning anywhere.
He warned splits in the nationalist vote could help unionist parties clinch some key seats when voters go to the polls.
Yet while support for independence and the SNP used to go hand in hand, that’s no longer the case, according to polling.
Mr MacNeil said his old party will struggle to be “taken seriously” in his island constituency due to a “conveyor belt of nonsense laws”.
Highland councillor Karl Rosie joined Alba last month, saying his former party had neglected the needs and priorities of the Highlands.
For those like Mr Rosie in Alex Salmond’s party – which will run at least a dozen candidates in the election – vague promises of a second referendum are no longer enough.
Alba has had no electoral success since being founded in 2021, but small margins could define who wins tightly contested seats.
The Scottish Greens – part of a power-sharing pact at Holyrood – plan to run a record number of candidates when the election is finally called.
To frustrated SNP figures, this is a waste given the two parties are allied and share much in common.
To the Greens, it’s a natural way to continue boosting their profile after record successes in 2021.
“No party owns anyone’s vote,” said North East Green MSP Maggie Chapman. “In the Scottish Greens, it is up to local branches to decide if and where to stand in elections.”
Green insiders said there was “frustration” at the SNP trying to corner the market for proindependence votes.
“Pro-independence voters are not a monolith,” one said. “They have a wide variety of things to motivate them at the ballot box.
“Independence, while really important, is not the main thing on the minds of voters.
“No political party owns a voter.”
The insider pointed out the SNP was once in a similar position to the Greens before it achieved major breakthroughs.
With independence unlikely to be on the agenda, the Greens and Alba are unlikely to be cowed.
But nowhere better exemplifies how lingering feuds threaten the nationalists at the ballot box than the Western Isles.
Labour candidate Torcuil Crichton already stood a strong chance of winning the seat anyway.
Now he has an even better chance of winning, given Mr MacNeil and the SNP will be taking votes from each other.
But Mr MacNeil remains bullish about his chances – and, if anything, thinks being kicked out of his old party might help him.
“Daily I conclude that it is an increasing asset for me to have been expelled from the SNP,” he said.
Woad-painted cranks line up with MSPs and a guy from River City
Among the many irritating aspects of modern political campaigning is the enthusiasm with which leaders insist we rely on the power of belief. No problem is insurmountable, if only we keep the faith.
Perhaps you remember, during the 2019 Conservative leadership contest (won by Boris Johnson), when candidate Rory Stewart mocked the idea that Brexit would be a success if only people believed in it.
That, said staunch remainer Stewart, would be like expecting to be able to put more rubbish in an overflowing bin simply through the power of faith. Believe in the bin and you can fit another bag in there.
It is, I think, safe to assume that when a politician urges “belief” in a project, it means he or she doesn’t have answers to difficult questions.
During the Brexit campaign of 2016, leave campaigners urged faith whenever a sticky subject came up. Wouldn’t the introduction of new customs regulations harm British businesses? Everything would be fine, so long as people believed.
And what about damage to the Good Friday Agreement? Wasn’t that worth thinking about? Of course not. All we had to do was believe.
Leading Brexiteers continue to struggle to demonstrate the benefits of the United Kingdom’s departure from the European Union, but they’ll never concede their project is flawed. Rather, if Brexit is failing, it’s because “remoaners” refuse to get with the programme. If only the naysayers would shut up, everything would be fine. Brexit will succeed just as soon as we all start believing in it.
In deciding simply to believe in a political project, we excuse ourselves from the difficult business of thinking about it. We allow ourselves to dismiss the concerns of sceptics as nothing more than bad-faith interventions.
The tendency to urge belief among supporters is not unique, in UK politics, to
Eurosceptics. Scottish nationalists have a proud tradition of imploring faith over detailed examination of their prospectus. Anyone who points out the financial holes in SNP plans should expect to be accused of talking Scotland down. Anyone who has entirely legitimate questions about pensions, currency and borders should brace themselves for the charge that they don’t believe in the country.
On Saturday, supporters of Scottish independence have been urged to gather in Glasgow for a march under the banner “Believe in Scotland”. Along with the usual professional nats from the world of entertainment, there’ll be flags – lots of ’em – and a speech from Humza Yousaf.
In the near-decade since Scotland’s last referendum on independence, there have been countless such marches up and down the country. Woad-painted cranks have lined up alongside Cabinet secretaries and some guy from River City and paraded through just about every town and city. And all to no effect.
In fact, I’m not sure that these displays aren’t actually harmful to the independence movement.
In the aftermath of the 2014 vote, Scottish voters hardened their positions on the constitutional question. Nationalists ignored the failings of the SNP Government in the name of keeping the independence dream alive, while many unionists, who’d rejected the Tories decades ago, backed Conservative candidates who promised to oppose a second referendum.
There is not, currently, a constituency of people in Scotland whose opposition to independence might be changed by the sight of thousands of people waving flags.
On the contrary, I think such marches perfectly symbolise exactly the things that turn people off the idea of independence. Each of these events has highlighted a downright weird combination of exceptionalism, grievance, and insecurity. From the outside looking in, it’s an entirely unpalatable cocktail.
Back in 2014, shortly before Scots voted on the constitutional question, a Yessupporting friend called. It was a Saturday afternoon, and his partner, having witnessed a gathering of a few thousand independence supporters at Calton Hill in Edinburgh, was absolutely convinced that victory was in the bag.
“She keeps saying there’s thousands there,” he told me, “And I keep telling her there’s millions more that aren’t.”
If only more independence supporters realised that the occasional show of numbers on the street is no sign that a campaign is moving forward. For every person who joins a flag-waving parade, there are very many more for whom the idea of doing so is preposterous.
This Saturday’s Believe in Scotland march may be a fun day out for nationalists, but it won’t shift opinion on the independence question one iota. I truly believe that.